If we approach adversities wisely, our hardest times can be times of greatest growth, which in turn can lead toward times of greatest happiness...Come what may, and love it! -Joseph B. Wirthlin

Tuesday, August 20, 2013

Staycation, All in the Name of Football

Several months ago Rinar and I scheduled our family vacation time. Rinar has to do that now because of his extensive travel schedule. Unbeknownst to us, we scheduled vacation number 2 the same week as football tryouts. Yes, for some reason here in Utah 11 year-old boys have to try out for the football team to see where they get put. You know, because when you are 11, these things are vitally important, on the same level as the North Korean missile crisis and preventing world hunger. It is that important around here, apparently.

Hence, vacation became staycation. Bummer. But we tried to make the best of it.

On Monday, July 29th we headed down to Provo to go to Seven Peaks with my sister Catye and her husband Mike. Catye worked at Seven Peaks last year and she had a whole bunch of free tickets. Staycation was looking pretty darn affordable. The kids had a blast, but we had to hurry back to get Raef to football tryouts on time, so we didn't get to stay as long as we would have liked.

On Tuesday, we headed up to Hogle Zoo. But it was blazing hot. The kids only lasted a few hours and then it was time to get some pizza.

And if you are going to get pizza, the obvious place to go is The Pie. Where else? The kids thoroughly enjoyed the fare. Then we had to call an audible for afternoon activities, because our original plan did not give us enough time to hurry back for...yep, football tryouts. This meant a quick trip to the Church Museum to see the kid's Book of Mormon exhibit.

Wednesday was my favorite. We dedicated the whole day to This is the Place Heritage Park. It happens to be across the street from the zoo. It is a pioneer village with oodles of things to do, a hands-on, living museum. Harry and Zach enjoyed a "shave" at the barber shop while the other ones waited by playing checkers.

They got to ride the ponies, and totally loved it. There was also a petting zoo, and lots of historic buildings.

This little pioneer house was a big hit. They washed clothes on a real scrub board, beat the rug with a wire whisky thing, plowed the soil with a real hand plow, played toss-a-ring, and even gave it a go at stilt walking.

When it got too hot, they spent a bit of time playing in the splash pad. I had no idea there was one there, so we were woefully unprepared. But after ringing out the shirts and staying outside for a little bit, they were dry in a short amount of time. We also rode a train, panned for gold, made an arrowhead necklace, and ate ice cream at the old hotel. And then we packed the kids up and hurried home. Surprising, I know, but had to get to football tryouts on time.We were tuckered out by Thursday and hung around the house. Rinar did take them swimming for a little while and then it was off to football again.On Friday, Rinar took Raef, Zach, and Eli to Lagoon, or as Eli calls it...Magoon. We made sure that they got there right when it opened. They stayed as long as they could before they rushed back for football tryouts. After football, Rinar took Raef and Zach back until closing time.As for football, I might have been a little annoyed. Okay, maybe a lot. We gave up a week of vacation so that he could tryout for teams that were pretty much already decided before anyone showed up for the first day of tryouts. Most of those boys had played in the system before. Everything was predetermined. There is an A team. Yep, that never happened. There was a B team. Nope, didn't make that one. And then there were the color teams, like gray, blue, white, etc. The color teams are for all the rest of the boys, whether they tried out or not.Raef is on the gray team.I am just so glad we had to lose a vacation and rush back from every activity early so that he could be on the gray team, a team he would have probably been put on even if we had gone to Yellowstone for the week.But whatever!